The Man
by wordonawing
Summary: 24th October, 1995. Little Rory Williams wakes up to find the strangest man he's ever met wounded in his back garden. But it's not who you might think...


**A/N: Just a little intro thing I wrote. I might extend this into a series of moments, if anyone's interested in reading more. Please review if you enjoy it! :)**

**By the way, the man is most certainly not the Doctor, though I suppose you could be forgiven for thinking that.**

Rory is just drifting off into the welcome embrace of sleep when he hears a weird noise outside.  
He freezes, listening intently, but all he can hear is the soft drip-drip of the tap downstairs and a pigeon cooing in the big apple tree at the bottom of the garden.  
He shrugs, turns over and closes his eyes again.  
A few minutes later, it goes again - a sort of heavy thumping, accompanied by a scratching sound, like a massive cat is padding around Leadworth and decided to curl up in front of their house for a nap.  
It's really annoying.  
Sighing, Rory gets up and slips his bare feet into his scuffed trainers. He grabs his torch and dressing gown, and oh-so-carefully creeps out of his room and down the stairs, making sure not to tread on the creaky bottom step. The door is unlocked, which is strange, since Rory distinctly heard his dad bolting it before he went up to bed. He shakes off his confusion and steps out into the freezing garden.

Tiny drops of dew are clinging to the thick grass, and his trainers are soon soaked through. The little torch throws a shaft of light onto the hedges, making the darkness seem all that more scary. A branch cracks somewhere to his left, and he spins round, breath catching in his throat. Calm down, he tells himself sternly. It's nothing, just a bird or something. Probably that pigeon that was cooing earlier. Yeah. Just a pigeon.  
No harm in taking a look, though.  
Rory inches forward, gripping the torch tightly, swinging the tunnel of illumination from side to side. Another crack, closer this time. His heart thumps against his ribcage. There's something there, lurking in the shadows just beyond the apple tree. Something big and dark and terri -  
There is a sound like someone clicking their fingers, and a ball of light appears, floating like a beacon in the darkness. Rory rubs his eyes and pinches himself to make sure he's not dreaming. That's impossible. Lights do not float in mid-air.  
"Don't they?" The voice is weak, book-ended by hoarse. Rory jumps, and looks around the garden, searching for the speaker. How did they know what he was thinking?  
"How'd you think? My word, what do they teach you at school these days?"  
"Who...who are you?" Rory asks, desperately trying to mask the quiver in his voice.  
The ball of light grows until it illuminates the figure, and Rory doesn't know whether to breathe a sigh of relief or run away in terror.  
On the one hand, it's not a monster. It's just a man, long and lean, with kind green eyes that sparkle in the starlight. On the other hand, he looks like he's come home from a war; his face is bruised and battered, hair matted with mud, and his clothes are torn and bloodstained. He's lying down in the grass, hidden from the house behind a low wall, one hand propping him up on his side. The other is pressed against his chest, and Rory can just make out dark liquid sliding through his fingers. "You're hurt," he says timidly, kneeling down and feeling the dew seep into his skin.  
"Yeah. That's what happens when you address a Sontaran commander as 'Mr Potato Head'." The man smiles grimly. Rory has no idea what he's talking about, so opts to keep quiet and shuffle a little closer.

"Do you need any help?"  
The man looks at him, surprise etched in every line of his face, then grunts and winces in pain. "Nothing you can do tonight, Rory," he pants. "Go back to bed and come back in the morning. Maybe with some food and water."  
Rory is a little confused, but something in this man's tone makes him want to trust him, so he stands up and attempts to brush the dirt from his striped pyjamas bottoms. "Okay. Are you sure you're alright?"  
"No," the man says mildly. "But you can't do anything about that."

"Bye, then." Rory gives an awkward little wave as he turns to go, and the man smiles at him with a sort of endearing fondness in his eyes, as if he's known Rory his whole life.  
Before he's gone three paces, something strikes him as odd, and he turns back.  
"How did you know my -"  
He stops. Stares at the space behind the wall where he knows, _knows_ the man was.  
It is empty. There is no sign there was ever anyone here but him.  
"Name..."  
Rory shrugs, dusts himself off, and goes back to bed.


End file.
